If you read my posts you'll see that I acknowledged that shouting someone down isn't illegal, but reflects poorly on the students and if you think that any person has an obligation to prevent someone they disagree with from speaking then that effectively defeats the purpose of not allowing the government to interfere with free speech.

Except that our whole constitution and legal system are premised on the difference between public and private actions and actors. My mom can punish me for taking the Lord's name in vain; the police can't.

I'm not saying what they did should be illegal. I am saying that it shows they don't care about free speech. It is true that if everytime someone got outraged they behaved like this we would have much less of an open public dialogue.

He was going there to give a speech about how what they do is right and good and necessary and patriotic. I haven't read the backstory, I just watched the video BB linked to, but I'm assuming that he was brought there to speak by the CRs or something (e.g. that feminine hygiene product the cameraperson spoke to at the end) and that he wasn't participating in an academic debate with an intelligent and knowledgeable opponent (e.g. a Columbia professor, or even a "public intellectual" like Noam Chomsky). Just him talking, an event of organized propaganda. How is that not recruitment?

who cares if he was recruiting or not? that's totally irrelevant. It is not an illegal organization. If you think it should be, then convince a prosecutor to charge these people with conspiracy or lobby Congress and state legislatures to amend the constitution to outlaw "paramilitary" organizations.

It couldn't be more clear from your post that it is the content his speech that bothers you. You don't like the fact that he doesn't like Mexican people, that he thinks the government should build a wall on the border, that he thinks the government should shoot people trying to cross the border or whatever.

The post you're quoting was specifically a reply to demingh's question of how what he's doing qualifies as recruitment. Nothing less, nothing more -- context is everything in interpretation, you know. Not only is that therefore relevant, it's everything. Perhaps you meant to respond to a different post?

the context of your remark is a discussion about whether the columbia students should have shouted him down when other people have made comments to the effect that he was recruiting for a paramilitary organization, as if that somehow justifies what they did

so what you are saying is that if a person belongs to an organization where most people own guns and owns a gun himself then he ought not to have freedom of speech?

This board is really struggling with the concept of 'armed' and 'paramilitary'. This isn't the local 4H. These people own and operate helicopter gunships and put on their little brownshirt marches armed to the teeth. There is a false parallelism here that you and CLS are making between what you perceive as equal groups of vigiliantes. I do not command an army. That is how the set of private actors differ. Furthermore, I don't have the implicit and explicit support of the border patrol and police and they sure the @#!* wouldn't look the other way if I decided to gun down or kidnap a few people.

If this group is allowed to recruit on Columbia's campus, then who isn't?

there isn't anything illegal about being an armed militia. so why should they be denied their right to speak? if you're saying columbia shouldn't have invited him, fine. But it seems like you are saying that people should stop him from speaking, whereever or whenever, no matter how many people want to hear him, and even though he has done nothing illegal.

I think that people ought to able to express themselves unless their speech is a criminal act

And his opponents also have a legal right to speak, which they exercised. Fun!

if you dont know what was going to be said in that speech, then you don't know what he was doing. and more specifically, you don't know HOW he recruits people.

So if Hitler comes to speak, or OBL comes to speak, I don't know what he's doing or how he's recruiting people until he's actually spoken? I know the arguments of the Minutemen and how they operate, I think, at least well enough to make this assessment. How does he recruit people? Charisma, rhetorical tricks, superficially sounding like he knows what he's talking about, appeals to racist sentiment, appeals to "patriotism," framing it as an issue of helping the government and the police and the military, framing it as an issue of the government having failed and we have to take things into our own hands... look, the point is, none of it's valid. How does hearing him give this particular speech at this particular university allow me to understand what he's saying and how he's doing it in a way in which it benefits me to listen?

If you read my posts you'll see that I acknowledged that shouting someone down isn't illegal, but reflects poorly on the students and if you think that any person has an obligation to prevent someone they disagree with from speaking then that effectively defeats the purpose of not allowing the government to interfere with free speech.

Many of the larger firms do encourage thier attorneys to do some pro bono work every year. It fits into their PR strategy. "We're not all cold and heartless, we are compassionate and good corporate citizens" My firm is like this along with a lot of others in so-cal.

yea, but on other hand you have pressure to do actual work, and even at the best firms the average of pro-bono hours per lawyer is under 100 per year

But If you paid off the loans over a period longer than 5 years, as you suggest, this would raise the total loan amount counting against the lawyer (interest)...I don't know how this would help (instead of 150k now its like 200k perhaps more). I dont think my bro has gotten too far into his loans because of the interest and minimum payments and all that.

and like all posts, this one is now off topic.

I included that when I was taking the payments out of the lawyer's salary.

He was going there to give a speech about how what they do is right and good and necessary and patriotic. I haven't read the backstory, I just watched the video BB linked to, but I'm assuming that he was brought there to speak by the CRs or something (e.g. that feminine hygiene product the cameraperson spoke to at the end) and that he wasn't participating in an academic debate with an intelligent and knowledgeable opponent (e.g. a Columbia professor, or even a "public intellectual" like Noam Chomsky). Just him talking, an event of organized propaganda. How is that not recruitment?

who cares if he was recruiting or not? that's totally irrelevant. It is not an illegal organization. If you think it should be, then convince a prosecutor to charge these people with conspiracy or lobby Congress and state legislatures to amend the constitution to outlaw "paramilitary" organizations.

It couldn't be more clear from your post that it is the content his speech that bothers you. You don't like the fact that he doesn't like Mexican people, that he thinks the government should build a wall on the border, that he thinks the government should shoot people trying to cross the border or whatever.

so what you are saying is that if a person belongs to an organization where most people own guns and owns a gun himself then he ought not to have freedom of speech?

This board is really struggling with the concept of 'armed' and 'paramilitary'. This isn't the local 4H. These people own and operate helicopter gunships and put on their little brownshirt marches armed to the teeth. There is a false parallelism here that you and CLS are making between what you perceive as equal groups of vigiliantes. I do not command an army. That is how the set of private actors differ. Furthermore, I don't have the implicit and explicit support of the border patrol and police and they sure the @#!* wouldn't look the other way if I decided to gun down or kidnap a few people.

If this group is allowed to recruit on Columbia's campus, then who isn't?

there isn't anything illegal about being an armed militia. so why should they be denied their right to speak? if you're saying columbia shouldn't have invited him, fine. But it seems like you are saying that people should stop him from speaking, whereever or whenever, no matter how many people want to hear him, and even though he has done nothing illegal.

I think that people ought to able to express themselves unless their speech is a criminal act

At a rally I’d probably agree with you, except for any stage-taking. What happened here, however, violates the spirit of the academic freedom Columbia extends to guests, be they unpopular, violently opposed to the United States, or even arguably illegal.

And this really is the only point of disagreement, the rest are issues of tactics and efficacy. Do we allow all groups to participate in paramilitary society? Do we extend academic freedom to armed paramilitary groups? I've taken a very narrow stance here, focusing on armed paramilitary groups. I think extending academic freedom to Al Qaeda is stupid.

so what you are saying is that if a person belongs to an organization where most people own guns and owns a gun himself then he ought not to have freedom of speech?

oh yes, and the very fact of belonging to al qaeda makes it possible for the state to take action. if he were just some cleric who subscribed to osama's vision of the world? shouting him down would be the wrong way to go. people need to hear why we don't agree with him.

And if this hypothetical group of angry islamofacists started arming themselves and marching around, you think it would be ok to let him recruit on your campus. Interesting. Personally, I won't wait until I'm on the losing end of the barrel of a gun before I take action.

what the @#!*? did this guy come to columbia with a pick-up truck with a machine gun mounted in the back and a couple of dozen armed guards? You keep emphasizing how they are armed. So what? owning and carrying a gun on the texas border is legal, and what does that have to do with travelling to new york, unarmed, to give a speech?

you're basically saying that private actors should take action against private actors because they're acting as private actors?

if an al qaeda leader came to columbia, we could easily arrest him for other things that he's done. brownshirts? same thing. if people are really so opposed to the minutemen and convinced that they're inciting violence, then there are legitimate means for shutting them down.

You're stuffing the rabbit in the hat when you say "taking action," so it should come as no surprise that you pull out something that seems plausible. The action I'm advocating is non-violent and legal. I'm not advocating vigilantiasm. The protestors broke no laws. They merely acted to show that The Minutemen should not be allowed to recruit without some resistance.

You're trying to avoid the hypothetical (which I'd say adequately describes the situation) by trying to find another reason for legal action. I'm advocating that in the absence of a legally cognizable reason for the police to get involved, civil society actors should take non-violent (and legal) actions to shun racist and armed paramilitary groups.

So let's try it again. An Al Qaeda recruiter, who has not broken any law and thus cannot be arrested, should be allowed to come to campus and students should do nothing? Whether it's turning your back, drowning him out, taking the stage, so long as its non-violent, I think it's an ok response.

No one said what the protestors did was illegal. But it shows they don't care about free speech unless they agree with it. This kind of behavior is designed to prevent people from expressing themselves.